Armageddon Rules (17 page)

“He might have forgotten to mention it.”

Rosa canceled the lockdown, and the door to her bulletproof cage unlocked.

“Marissa, if I wanted you dead, I’d have given the huntsman a couple more seconds.” Mikey walked over and slipped the crossbow out from under the chairs. “Can’t leave this here. Grimm says if it can’t be eaten by a toddler, it doesn’t go on the floor.”

“So why did you come to work for Grimm?” I ignored Beth’s whimpering and stuck with Mikey. Sure, I had a one-track mind, but when it came to people who intended to kill me, it was usually justified. I climbed up off the floor and sat down in a chair, ruining it.

Mikey sat down beside me. “I came here to kill you. Of course, Fairy Godfather already knew. Somehow he knew I didn’t have a commercial driver’s license, and somehow he knew I was supposed to kill you and bring back your heart.”

“And he hired you because?”

Mike wiped his hands on his pants. “Well, I was told that one way to become the greatest leader was to avenge Granddad. Fairy Godfather offered me another way.”

Granddad. So that explained the family fur. Also, the serious regeneration. Fenris had been so strong that it took several of Grimm’s most powerful weapons to kill him. Even then, it’d been a close thing. “I like the idea of anything that doesn’t involve killing me.”

“He offered to send me to culinary school. Did you know we’ve been living in the sixteen hundreds? There’s so many great ways to spice and prepare meat that don’t involve bacon. For instance, a handful of coriander and peppercorns complements white meat sausage in amazing ways.”

“Like pork sausage?”

Mikey studied the carpet for a bit. “Umm, sure. Pork. Coriander and pepper would be great with pork. The point is, we can eat so much better. Grimm sends me to night college, and during the day I work here. When I have my chef’s hat I’m going to go back and lead my people by their stomachs. And for once, I won’t mean by their entrails.”

“You don’t happen to go to the same college Ari does, do you?” I suddenly wondered if Grimm hadn’t arranged a little protection for Ari while she studied. Even a third-string princess like Ari tended to attract a lot of attention, not all of it positive.

Mikey grinned, waving to Beth as Rosa stood her up. “I walk Ari to campus every night. My building’s on the same block.”

At the thought of Ari, my stomach turned sour. “We got ambushed.”

Rosa led Beth out of the booth and into the back, giving Mikey a thumbs-up. If she ever offered me a thumb, it was in the eye.

“Rosa saved us,” said Mikey. “She hit the alarm the moment they came in, pulled the piper girl into her booth, and kept them busy long enough for me to gut the hired help. I’d have gotten the huntsman too, but Fairy Godfather said no changing to full wolf.” He traced a scar on his chest where a bolt had pierced him.

“All right.” I stood up and locked the front door, turning the “Closed” sign. “Take Big Bill to the hospital. Check on Ari, but don’t annoy the ninja, or you might get to regrow a few fingers.” Then I went back to the showers, washed the cut on my head clean, and began to worry.

See, we’d had other employees in the past. Previous agents who didn’t precisely work for Grimm anymore. Most of the others were dead, but one in particular had me worried. An older woman named Jess Harrison. Half djinn, with the beauty, speed, and incredible emotional imbalances that came with it.

From time to time, Grimm would spring her from the mental hospital, but invariably she’d wind up going off the deep end and hurting some waiter who got her order wrong, or breaking the knees of someone who parked in a handicapped spot without a sticker. I wasn’t saying they didn’t have it coming. Just that it got harder and harder to justify.

Eventually, we had her committed. On enough Thorazine, she painted beautiful watercolor landscapes without stabbing orderlies in the eye with the paintbrush. As soon as I got out of the shower, I put in a call to the hospital and waited for the automated attendant. A woman with a deep Irish brogue rattled off recorded options:

“You have reached St. Lecter’s Home for the Violent. Our menu options have recently changed, so listen closely. If you want to report an escape, press one. If you want to plan an escape, press two. If you are calling to report that a homicidal queen has dispatched an assassin team to cut power to the Home, then get slaughtered by patients while attempting to break in, press three. For all other options, press nine.
Para español, marque ocho.
”

I pressed three, and then hung up. No wonder Grimm liked the place.

I’d barely had time to put my head down on my desk before someone knocked at the door. I looked up to see Rosa. Our receptionist had never been a people person, unless you counted “Can’t Stand Them” as a type of people person. Even after Grimm put me in charge, she still ignored me most days and infuriated me when she wasn’t ignoring me.

Under her arm, Rosa carried a metal briefcase. She walked into my office without so much as asking, and slammed it on my desk. “Listen.” Then she opened it up. What lay inside looked like a combination DVD player and sixth-grade science project. From the moment she pressed the large button marked “Power,” it hummed and shook. Then the whole thing lit up with a laser glow, and a picture of Grimm appeared on the screen.

I looked up at Rosa, who didn’t seem the least bit surprised. “If this is one of those ‘if you are hearing this, I’m dead’ messages, I’m not interested.”

Rosa left without a word.

I checked for controls. There weren’t any. Not even a volume button. “Isn’t this the part where it starts doing something? Some sort of message? Last will and testament?”

“No, my dear,” said the image on screen. “This isn’t a message. It’s a test.” Grimm, or something like him, watched me from the screen.

I carefully unhooked my Agency bracelet, noting that his image remained on screen.

Then Rosa came back. She carried her sawed-off shotgun and carefully loaded two slugs into it. Then with a click she closed the chamber and leveled it at me.

“A test?”

“Yes,” said the Grimm. “One that I sincerely hope you pass.”

A moment ticked by as I watched the screen for some hint of what to do. I looked back at Rosa, wondering if I could make it under my desk faster than she could pull the trigger. “So tell me what kind of test this is. No, wait. Tell me what you are. You aren’t him.”

“Marissa, I am an echo, captured by intention of Fairy Godfather two years ago, on the twenty-fourth of August. If it makes it easier, you may refer to me as Grimm as well.”

“Are you intelligent?” Grimm left a copy of himself. Maybe. An echo? Some form of his power that wasn’t affected by whatever had him frozen.

The Echo looked over his glasses at me with a stern look. “That’s no sort of question for me. I’m a complete record of the Fairy Godfather’s thoughts while he captured me. In that respect I am smarter than every scientist the human race has ever produced.” He definitely had Grimm’s arrogance.

“Fine. I’ll call you Echo. Grimm’s his name, and names mean something to me. Tell me about the test.” I glanced over to Rosa, who acted as if she hadn’t heard a single word.

Echo cleared his throat and waited for me to look back to him. “It’s simple, my dear. Convince me you are not something pretending to be Marissa. I should warn you, the weapon Rosa has is loaded with reaper bullets. You may recall them.”

I did. I’d used several of them to kill things that weren’t supposed to die. If I got shot by one of those, I hoped it hit me in the head. Otherwise I’d have several agonizing seconds while it devoured me.

So all I had to do was be me. In theory. “Echo, why did Grimm create you?”

He paused for a moment, considering my question. “Surprising. This isn’t relevant to your survival, my dear.”

“Humor me.”

“After his mirror was broken, the Fairy Godfather considered for the first time that there might come an eventuality when he was not available to handle his business. Indeed, until you killed a fairy, we didn’t think it was possible.” Echo glanced to the handmaiden’s mark.

“So are you some sort of will?”

“No, my dear, I am a test.” Echo crossed his arms, looking disturbingly like an actual Grimm.

I closed my eyes for a moment, trying to figure out what on earth Grimm was thinking when he came up with this scheme. “So how do I convince you I’m me?”

“Determining that is part of the test.”

Echo really was a copy of Grimm, with his annoying “I’m always right” and circular logic loops.

“My name is Marissa Locks. I’ve been your agent for eight years. You called me Goldy Locks, because I do things
just
right.” I stopped and waited.

Echo looked up at Rosa and shook his head.

“My last name was Lambert. My sister’s name is Hope. You fixed her heart.”

He continued to regard me like a lump of meat. Rosa, on the other hand, had a wicked smile. I hated it when she smiled, because the only thing that really made her happy was ruining someone’s day. I figured the only reason Grimm kept her on was she came with the building.

“What does it take to get you to understand that I’m me? I have the handmaiden’s mark, for Kingdom’s sake.” I gave Echo the glare that usually got to Grimm.

Echo rolled his eyes. “If the Black Queen sent someone in your place, she would most certainly bear the mark.”

And right there, I stopped worrying about the shotgun pointed at my chest. See, Grimm, the real Grimm, always insisted the Black Queen was dead. That the mark on my hand was some form of minor curse that came around every so often. “Echo, is the Black Queen dead?”

His eyes widened, then the corners of his mouth turned up ever so slightly. “She is not alive. I recommend you don’t waste any more of your questions on this line of inquiry. Fairy Godfather suspected Rosa was somewhat inclined to shoot you regardless of the outcome.”

“What do you mean?” I sat up and leaned on my desk. “Don’t waste my questions?”

“I’ll only answer so many of them before I decide that in fact you are a facsimile of Marissa, attempting to determine a way to convince me. That, by the way, was a question.”

“So help me out. Tell me what I have to do to convince you.” I was careful to avoid phrasing my question in the form of a question. I preferred checkers to sudden-death
Jeopardy!

Echo folded his arms and waited.

“You don’t have to tell me the answer. Let me know if I’m supposed to ask you something, tell you something, or do something.”

“Yes,” said Echo.

Rosa released the safety on her shotgun and walked to the side to line up a better shot at me.

About then, I realized whatever I was supposed to be doing, I wasn’t. I didn’t have the slightest idea what Grimm’s Echo was looking for to prove myself. I took the briefcase and set it in my lap, weighing my options. Grimm had a set of rules, and all I had to do was figure them out, but I’d never been a “by the rules” girl. So we’d do it my way.

“All right, Echo. One last question. Is this briefcase bulletproof?” In the moment before he could answer, I shot to my feet, briefcase in hand. The metal top collided with Rosa’s shotgun right as it went off. I pushed the barrel up and away, charging straight into Rosa, knocking her into the wall.

I’d taken more self-defense courses than I could count, and in the last couple of years I’d had Jess train me on visiting day. Lots of martial arts teach you to use your knees or your fists. I used the briefcase. I smashed it into Rosa’s jaw, then her arm, causing her to drop the shotgun. A second blow across her head sent her reeling. I threw down the briefcase and picked up the shotgun.

“Now you listen.” I still had one more reaper bullet. The way her gaze flitted to the shotgun told me she knew it too.

To her credit, Rosa dropped the arm she’d held over her face and looked at me. If you had to die, facing it head-on was good in my book.

“You ever aim this thing at me again, I’ll have the dwarves grind it up and put it in your feeding tube.” I opened the shotgun and removed the remaining reaper bullet, then threw the empty gun at her. “Get back out there, answer the phone, and get ready to open the office. If you even think about reloading and coming back, I’ll order Mikey to play with you.”

Rosa stood, leaning heavily on the gun. I’d hit her harder than I realized. If it weren’t for the fact that she could file a workman’s comp claim, I’d have taken a photo for my memory book.

“My dear,” said Echo, his voice muffled by the briefcase, “I’d appreciate it if you didn’t kill her. She’s your notary public, and you’ll need her to sign the papers.”

Rosa hobbled over and opened the briefcase. With a click, the lower section unsealed. What I thought was only electronics held a thick raft of papers, and one of Grimm’s favorite fountain pens. Rosa threw a pen at me, flinching when I caught it. “Start signing.”

“I don’t sign anything without reading.” I turned over the first raft of papers.

“Then we will be here for several weeks,” said Echo. “These contracts, to put it simply, give you control of the Agency until the Fairy Godfather returns, or you die.”

“So Grimm wanted me to own the Agency?”

Echo nodded. “
Own
is a nebulous word. Fairy Godfather considered you most appropriate to keep the Agency functioning in the event of his demise or incapacitation. His arrangements will put several spell casters on your permanent retainer, and of course, you will have access to all Agency accounts. It was a pleasure not having you killed, Marissa.”

Rosa hit the Power button, and Echo disappeared. Then she looked over at me and took out an impossibly large stack of papers. “Sign. Please.”

Fifteen